Listening to certain Christians, you would think that opposition to homosexuality is one of the most basic principles of the Christian faith. But this year, as a small group of Christians turn up to protest against the Pride festival in central London, they will be easily outnumbered by the Christians who are participating in Pride, celebrating diverse sexuality as a gift from God.

When religion is invoked as a reason to stand up against injustice, a cynic might say that religion really has nothing to do with it, that the people involved would have taken the same political action anyway. So does religion really have the power to be an effective force for social change? A brief look at mysticism can help us to answer this question.